The Rensselaer County clerk defies a state law that makes some gun ownership records public.

THE STAKES:

Since when did obeying the law become optional for elected officials?

Memo to Rensselaer County Clerk Frank Merola: Your election brings with it certain duties. They include complying with the law, including a new state law making some — that part can't be emphasized enough — gun ownership records public, under certain circumstances.

Instead Mr. Merola is showing his defiant side. He's decided that he won't release information about who in the county has a pistol permit, even when those people don't request that those records be sealed.

So goes the often obstinate fallout from a understandable effort by the Cuomo administration to better regulate gun ownership in the wake of the Newtown massacre.

As it is, the governor backed off a bit over maintaining what would have been a limited yet useful database. No longer will pistol permit holders automatically be listed publicly, though the information would remain accessible through the Freedom of Information Act. People who prefer to keep such potentially vital information private can apply for an exemption to an especially contentious law. Rifle owners aren't listed at all.

That should be more than good enough for Mr. Merola. Yet by declaring that none of that information will be public, a county clerk joins the ranks of lawbreakers.

Again, Mr. Cuomo takes the more reasonable tone.

"That's not for a county clerk to do on a blanket basis," he says. "You can't decide what the law is or change the law. Their job is to enforce the law administratively."

Mr. Merola, or any county clerk, is free to speak out against the law and try to get the Legislature to change it. So, too, can all the county sheriffs who also oppose the law.

That much Mr. Cuomo acknowledges. He says of the state Sheriff's Association's support of a lawsuit against the New York SAFE Act: "They're free to litigate — God bless America."

Such freedom to speak out or contest a law in court, however, doesn't extend to a right not to enforce it. For sheriffs, that means enforcing a more broadly defined ban on assault weapons. For clerks like Mr. Merola, it means quite a bit less — complying with a law that actually reduced public access to gun ownership records.

About 20,000 people in Rensselaer County legally own pistols. About 2,000 have taken legal steps to keep their records private, on the grounds that they're law enforcement officers; have an order of protection; were a witness or jury member in a criminal court case; or fear for their safety.

Mr. Merola, however, says that keeping the records of those gun owners separate from those of the 18,000 people who haven't objected to their information being public is just too hard.

"I can't distinguish between those who opted out and haven't opted out," he says, calling into question both his willingness and his ability to perform such a routine task.

If Mr. Merola wants to make laws and set policies, he should seek a higher office. Otherwise, he should do his job as a county clerk.